“If we adopt the UN Declaration on the Rights on Indigenous People they can be the guiding principles that governments and anybody else should adhere to when drafting policies or legislation in regards to Aboriginal people”

Equally, other sector leaders like Paula Abood (Cultural Diversity) Lenine Bourke (Children and Young People) Veronica Pardo (Accessibility) have argued for the importance of equivalent UN rights statements in their areas of specialisation.

We are developing a way of visualising and describing the interconnectedness of these various international rights frameworks through the analogy of a tree. Applying the First Peoples First principles, the root system and trunk represent the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People and the branches each represent a connected rights based framework – cultural diversity, children and young people, disability etc.The Rights Tree gives us a way of describing the interconnections between the priorities emerging through our national conversations and to step outside partisan policy frameworks. Enacting the agreements to which Australia is already a signatory becomes a practical way in which to advance the concept of a shared future vision.

The 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda

The UN has identified 17 goals to achieve a sustainable global development agenda – coincidentally, also by the year 2030. The absence of arts and culture from the 17 goals presents both a challenge and an opportunity that Arts Front will address over the next three years.